outset.
‘So I can do what I want with them?’ she asked thoughtfully as he sat back down, looking relaxed again, believing he’d smoothed the rough water. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Quite sure, Lyd.’ She smarted again beneath the fake endearment. ‘Spend Christmas and New Year in the sun, then once the dust has settled you can transfer them back to me and we will have made millions. It can be our little investment.’
How devious could he get? How had she never noticed before just what he was like?
Because you have grown up.
‘I might just do that,’ she said with a smile on her face that was so hard to achieve. ‘In actual fact I think I will fly out to one of them tomorrow.’
‘That’s my girl. I knew you’d see sense.’ The condescending tone sickened her but she played her part to the end.
‘Now, if you will excuse me, I’ve got packing to do.’
As her father’s laughter trailed after her Lydia felt numb. She had lost her father long ago, and today she’d lost the man she’d fallen in love with. But the truth was she’d never been loved by Raul.
‘Have a good time and Merry Christmas.’ The belated words trailed down the wood-panelled hallway of his latest home and briefly she longed to slip back in time, to the home she’d grown up in, before her parents had parted company and she’d gone to live with her grandmother. But just as going back to the time she’d spent with Raul was impossible, so was going back to the small window of happiness in her childhood. The only way was forwards, even if it was fraught with pain.
‘I will.’ If he only knew what she really had planned for his little investment, he wouldn’t be so happy. First she would call her solicitor and get enough of the properties transferred into Raul’s name to cover the debt that, as far as she was concerned, her father still owed. After that she would sell the rest and give it all to charity. She wanted nothing to do with them. Only then did she feel she could move on from her disastrous first taste of love.
* * *
Raul had gone straight to the bar after his brother had left and ordered a whisky. He’d needed the hot fire of the amber liquid, not because of the way things had gone with Max, but because of the way things had gone with Lydia.
As the image of her lovely face swam into his mind he remembered the envelope she’d all but thrust at him and pulled it from his pocket. He placed it on the bar and ordered a second drink. The young woman behind the bar smiled at him as she placed the drink next to the envelope, but it was a smile wasted on him now. There was only one woman’s smile he wanted to see but he had to remember what she’d done, the story she’d sold.
Unable to believe the duplicity of Carlos, the only other person who knew the secrets of the past, or his blatant admission when challenged, he and Max had come up with their own exclusive to sell to the press. The proceeds were to be split equally between their favoured charity projects of Sports for Youngsters and Community Rebuild. The fact that they both headed charities proved yet another similarity between them and highlighted just how different they both were from their father. Except that Raul shared the fatal flaw of being unable to love, to give his heart to anyone.
He reached for his second drink, then paused, his hand over the envelope. Was he ready to read its contents? What was in it that was so bad his mother had never told him? He cursed beneath his breath. Why hadn’t he ever broached the subject with her? He ignored the drink and the oblivion it lured him with and picked up the envelope.
Around him the bar became busy with Christmas shoppers and businessmen and women. The noise level rose as everyone chatted against the backdrop of traditional carols, but he didn’t hear any of it. The forthcoming festive season was the last thing on his mind as he read, first the torn pages of what must have been his mother’s journal and then a letter, written to him by his mother, dated on his tenth birthday.
Both told the story of his father’s deception, of the brother he would never know and of her family’s insistence that they remain married or she would be disinherited and his double life exposed. Now her acceptance of his father’s behaviour made sense and the realisation that her story was out there in the world of the media made talking to her essential.
He’d rather do it face to face, be able to see her expression and be there to offer comfort, but London was nearly a three-hour flight from Madrid. There was only one option, so he moved away from the bar, to a quieter corner and took out his phone, waiting whilst the call he least wanted to make connected.
Just as he wondered if he’d done the right thing his mother’s voice sounded across the miles, her Spanish words grounding him. ‘I was expecting your call.’
‘Then you will know why I am calling.’ He didn’t ask, but made it clear he was stating a fact. He had no wish to hurt his mother, to drag up what must be a painful past, but he had to know the truth and it seemed, if nothing else, Lydia had been right about one thing. His mother was the best person to ask.
‘As soon as I saw you and Lydia together I knew it was time.’ Raul frowned. Where was this leading? Whatever it was she had to tell him had nothing to do with Lydia now and he was about to say just that when his mother spoke over his thoughts. ‘I could see how much she loves you—and how much you love her.’
He should correct her, should tell her she’d got it all wrong. How could anyone have imagined there was love between them? ‘I need to know why you kept the truth of Max from me.’
‘When you were young it was to try and mend things between you and your father, to try and keep the family together—for you, not anyone or anything else.’
A noisy group of couples sat at the table next to him, full of the joys of the festive season, but he couldn’t end the call now, he had to continue. ‘There was never any love lost between me and my father and now I know why. He already had a son—and had given him his name.’
‘I knew about the baby, but not the name,’ she carried on, her voice beginning to waver, and he wished there weren’t so many miles between them for this conversation. ‘I only found that out when his double life was exposed and you were so young and not getting on with your father, I couldn’t give you more reasons to fall out with him.’
‘You must have known it would come out?’ Raul snapped, ignoring the curious glance from the party next to him, turning his back on them and their happiness. He picked up his glass of whisky, about to take a long swig, when his mother answered.
‘That’s why I waited until you had the support of a woman who loves you.’
He cursed loudly in Spanish. ‘Lydia and I are not in love. We were forced into marriage because of a clause in the damn will. Her father’s debts and my father’s need to drag up the past forced us into an engagement.’
He heard his mother gasp. ‘He did that to you?’
‘Unless I found Max and shared the inheritance. Yes, he did that.’ Raul’s voice was granite hard and he tightened his grip around the glass so much he thought he might actually break it. ‘With help from Carlos.’
‘Carlos? I can’t believe he would stoop so low, but your father, yes.’
‘There will be no wedding, Mother. Lydia found Max, thanks to the information you gave her, and unlocked the funds Father had set aside as a reward for acknowledging Max as my older brother. He gambled on the fact that her father wouldn’t repay the debt and that I’d rather track down his firstborn son than get married.’
It angered Raul to think that his father had known him so well, played him to the very end, but in taking up that challenge he’d hurt others. His mother for one, but the fact that he’d hurt Lydia enough to make her hate him was too much.
‘He’d engineered it all, knowing he wouldn’t have long left?’ The shock in his mother’s voice was so clear he could imagine her sitting in her favourite chair and the expression on her face.